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If you've read the other threads then you should have realized that your job in these battles is not to kill the enemy yourself, that's what the NPC soldiers are for.

This is exactly the point,it's not a run-&-kill like everything else,I have been using an rk to keep archers alive and
keep soldiers fighting while placing barricades where they might do some good and help get me better merit while
I let the NPC's do their job of taking the brunt of the mobs. I've been doing solo/duo with kin and we've been having
fun figuring where to place barricades and ballista where they will do the most good as far as getting us the best
merit and possible points. Or just placing them in odd places to see what happens too, like a ballista on top of
pile or rock so it sets up in the air.

If you've read the other threads then you should have realised that your job in these battles is not to kill the enemy yourself, that's what the NPC soldiers are for.

If that were true there would not be a Vanguard class. R6 Vanguard's don't get +30% in-combat run speed in order to place barricades; or Killstreak powers in order to issue healing orders. All Vanguard powers are designed for fast killing of enemy mobs.

But nobody tries it. They mistakenly think you must all be engineers and officers to succeed. If people actually ran with a group of r6 Vanguards they would see how powerful that is. You can mow down those waves of adds in no time. You can protect workers WAY easier because you run so fast and deal such huge dmg the mobs die before the workers. But instead you have noobs forming groups in glff asking for only r4+ officers and engineers. And when you get in the group NOBODY is a Vanguard. Then they wonder why things still fail.

If that were true there would not be a Vanguard class. R6 Vanguard's don't get +30% in-combat run speed in order to place barricades; or Killstreak powers in order to issue healing orders. All Vanguard powers are designed for fast killing of enemy mobs.

But nobody tries it. They mistakenly think you must all be engineers and officers to succeed. If people actually ran with a group of r6 Vanguards they would see how powerful that is. You can mow down those waves of adds in no time. You can protect workers WAY easier because you run so fast and deal such huge dmg the mobs die before the workers. But instead you have noobs forming groups in glff asking for only r4+ officers and engineers. And when you get in the group NOBODY is a Vanguard. Then they wonder why things still fail.

of course they don't.. until you've got 120+ points to spend, vanguard is pretty much useless, and even then I really don't see the point. You gain 5% outgoing damage, and you could, if you earned enough kill points, debuff the enemy mobs for +5% AD, -5% OD, etc. Big deal. Sure, you can remove 30% morale with 1 skill, but it requires 20 killstreak which I couldn't even earn on my hunter. (You seem to need to get the kb on a mob to earn killstreak?) lottery.. Which feeds into the next point: it's just too bloody hard to figure out how to use the spec as intended. As such, nobody will bother, given that the benefits from the other two specs are so much more obvious and straightforward. I might try it if we had gotten a free 3rd spec preset to play with, but considering Turbine in its infinite wisdom has decided to charge me 800tp for it, I won't bother. The only sidequest for which the -30% morale thing is almost necessary is for the stupid ram at gate one in hornburg; in all other cases you can manage just as well with the other specs, or you simply don't earn enough killstreak points to make it viable to spec that way. Of course, low burst damage classes, or big-battle-gimped classes such as wardens could really use the -30% morale debuff, but good luck earning killstreak on a warden.

of course they don't.. until you've got 120+ points to spend, vanguard is pretty much useless, and even then I really don't see the point. You gain 5% outgoing damage, and you could, if you earned enough kill points, debuff the enemy mobs for +5% AD, -5% OD, etc. Big deal. Sure, you can remove 30% morale with 1 skill, but it requires 20 killstreak which I couldn't even earn on my hunter. (You seem to need to get the kb on a mob to earn killstreak?) lottery.. Which feeds into the next point: it's just too bloody hard to figure out how to use the spec as intended. As such, nobody will bother, given that the benefits from the other two specs are so much more obvious and straightforward. I might try it if we had gotten a free 3rd spec preset to play with, but considering Turbine in its infinite wisdom has decided to charge me 800tp for it, I won't bother. The only sidequest for which the -30% morale thing is almost necessary is for the stupid ram at gate one in hornburg; in all other cases you can manage just as well with the other specs, or you simply don't earn enough killstreak points to make it viable to spec that way. Of course, low burst damage classes, or big-battle-gimped classes such as wardens could really use the -30% morale debuff, but good luck earning killstreak on a warden.

The point is the trait down at the bottom, the one that increases the potency of Vanguard skills. I have been using Vanguard for a while because of it, although the recent nerf to how fast you build killstreak really hurt. The +45% skill potency applies to the +Incoming damage, making it +50% incoming damage. It applies to the Attack Duration, making it a useful debuff if there was anything that did enough damage to warrant it. It makes Piercing Roar epic in solo battles, as it will do almost 12k unmitigated damage then which will pretty much one shot everything, giving you enough killstreak to do it again in 15s.

The other big one is Killstreak skill duration, that applies to the stun from Stunning Bellow, making it a 10s stun.

Then there is also the matter of the outgoing heal modifier, great if you're having problems with that, the flat damage boost, the run speed boost. Vanguard is good, but I disagree with the earlier post about multiple Vanguards in a group. That might have worked before they nerfed killstreak building to be so incredibly slow, but now, since you need kbs to build killstreak, it just won't work with more than 2 or maybe 3 people using it in a raid.

I'm not sure if 120 points is really enough to make use of Vanguard either. I made a build for it around 150, but it didn't really start working great until I got 210.

The point is the trait down at the bottom, the one that increases the potency of Vanguard skills. I have been using Vanguard for a while because of it, although the recent nerf to how fast you build killstreak really hurt. The +45% skill potency applies to the +Incoming damage, making it +50% incoming damage. It applies to the Attack Duration, making it a useful debuff if there was anything that did enough damage to warrant it. It makes Piercing Roar epic in solo battles, as it will do almost 12k unmitigated damage then which will pretty much one shot everything, giving you enough killstreak to do it again in 15s.

The other big one is Killstreak skill duration, that applies to the stun from Stunning Bellow, making it a 10s stun.

Then there is also the matter of the outgoing heal modifier, great if you're having problems with that, the flat damage boost, the run speed boost. Vanguard is good, but I disagree with the earlier post about multiple Vanguards in a group. That might have worked before they nerfed killstreak building to be so incredibly slow, but now, since you need kbs to build killstreak, it just won't work with more than 2 or maybe 3 people using it in a raid.

I'm not sure if 120 points is really enough to make use of Vanguard either. I made a build for it around 150, but it didn't really start working great until I got 210.

I see. Thank you for the explanation, I will keep it in mind. That said, I 'only' have 189 points on both my wrd and my hunter, so I'm not sure I will enjoy it much, especially considering how easily everything dies from judiciously placed barricades...

Nice to know about red,and i have been using yellow(yellow/blue) mostly for the build,repair and trip wire trap
that seems to work nice. I will deff give red a try once I have enough points to build it up,and i'm wondering
too if you kill with a ballista if it will stack the kills?because I've been getting plenty of kills from shooting the
oncoming mobs.

Yes, because they're not T1 skirmishes. If you stand there and do nothing you stand a good chance of failing. If you stand there and get lucky so that you don't fail your rewards will be minimal. I have failed on these several times before getting the hang of it, even when I was working hard. If you start losing defenders then it just gets harder and you lose more defenders until you're overrun. On the 12 person Deeping Wall raid I've been several times but have not completed the main quests successfully, usually because everyone else is off at a side quest while the main wall gets overrun or Aragorn falls, etc.

There were people claiming you didn't need to do anything and still get gold/platinum, but that was just after NDA was lifted and if it actually was true if definitely does not apply today. There's a steep learning curve.

But nobody tries it. They mistakenly think you must all be engineers and officers to succeed.

But you need to get in killing blows to take advantage of vanguard abilities, but that's hard to do for a lot of classes especially melee-only. It's great if you're doing the side quests where there aren't many soldiers helping but is tough going in the main quest areas. It does not seem like the sort of thing to help someone out who feels unable to contribute enough damage, but is more useful possibly in things like deeping wall raid side quests when used by some classes. I suspect it gets better after spending lots and lots of points but early on it's a hindrance.

Whereas engineer is useful for any class, even an auto-leveled character with substandard DPS, even with only getting to tier 1 where you can put down traps.

Yes, because they're not T1 skirmishes. If you stand there and do nothing you stand a good chance of failing. If you stand there and get lucky so that you don't fail your rewards will be minimal. I have failed on these several times before getting the hang of it, even when I was working hard. If you start losing defenders then it just gets harder and you lose more defenders until you're overrun. On the 12 person Deeping Wall raid I've been several times but have not completed the main quests successfully, usually because everyone else is off at a side quest while the main wall gets overrun or Aragorn falls, etc.

There were people claiming you didn't need to do anything and still get gold/platinum, but that was just after NDA was lifted and if it actually was true if definitely does not apply today. There's a steep learning curve.

The 12 person Deeping Wall just needs one person (the leader) to know what he's doing. If you have that, you will almost never get less than gold.

So, when I was just trying to get Vandals in the Tower, I would sit afk in the Deeping Wall solo instance doing other things while waiting to see if I would get it. I went through the whole instance once, without ever doing anything at all. I got Silver overall, lost two banners, even managed to get Silver in a sidequest. All while completely afk without having done anything. It is, quite literally, impossible to lose any soldiers on the main wall during the Deeping Wall quest. I managed to complete the instance with a Silver reward while afk, I don't know how much easier than that it gets. If you don't believe me, go into Deeping Wall afk and see for yourself. That's the only one I've actually checked, but it's not really reaching to assume the other battles are at or near the same difficulty level, aside from Helm's Dike with the two difficult side quests.

^Ah ok, so you can get silver or sometimes a rare goldie if you afk...

But I want Platimum, friend. You know, the shiny one that gives you jewellrey set with bonus. The one that gives you the final promotion point in the quest that you luckily get that rare goldie, or two if you only afk a silver. The sole point that let help you to rank up a trait to rank 5 without having to spend it somewhere else less useful.

So, please teach me how to get a platimum whike afk aside from hoping the other 11 people in the HD raid knows how to do their stuff, do not share the same afk mindset like mine, and are too focus to notice me stand there doing nothing and vote to kick me out of their raid forever.

[I]"Deserves it! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death. And some die that deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then be not too eager to deal out death in the name of judgment. For even the wise cannot see all ends"[/I] - [B]Gandalf[/B]

^Ah ok, so you can get silver or sometimes a rare goldie if you afk...

But I want Platimum, friend. You know, the shiny one that gives you jewellrey set with bonus. The one that gives you the final promotion point in the quest that you luckily get that rare goldie, or two if you only afk a silver. The sole point that let help you to rank up a trait to rank 5 without having to spend it somewhere else less useful.

So, please teach me how to get a platimum whike afk aside from hoping the other 11 people in the HD raid knows how to do their stuff, do not share the same afk mindset like mine, and are too focus to notice me stand there doing nothing and vote to kick me out of their raid forever.

Originally Posted by Fasin1

The 12 person Deeping Wall just needs one person (the leader) to know what he's doing. If you have that, you will almost never get less than gold.

So, when I was just trying to get Vandals in the Tower, I would sit afk in the Deeping Wall solo instance doing other things while waiting to see if I would get it. I went through the whole instance once, without ever doing anything at all. I got Silver overall, lost two banners, even managed to get Silver in a sidequest. All while completely afk without having done anything. It is, quite literally, impossible to lose any soldiers on the main wall during the Deeping Wall quest. I managed to complete the instance with a Silver reward while afk, I don't know how much easier than that it gets. If you don't believe me, go into Deeping Wall afk and see for yourself. That's the only one I've actually checked, but it's not really reaching to assume the other battles are at or near the same difficulty level, aside from Helm's Dike with the two difficult side quests.

I'll try and make it more clear. I bolded what you need to reread.
See, in the first paragraph I'm talking about the raid instance. In the second paragraph I'm talking about the solo instance. The giveaway is the "solo instance" phrase in the second paragraph.

To be clear, I was in there by myself, in the solo instance. I did not find a way to squeeze 11 other people into the solo version. I was quoting Lohi who said there was a good chance of failing if you stood around and did nothing, I'm saying the battles are too easy.

I'll try and make it more clear. I bolded what you need to reread.
See, in the first paragraph I'm talking about the raid instance. In the second paragraph I'm talking about the solo instance. The giveaway is the "solo instance" phrase in the second paragraph.

To be clear, I was in there by myself, in the solo instance. I did not find a way to squeeze 11 other people into the solo version. I was quoting Lohi who said there was a good chance of failing if you stood around and did nothing, I'm saying the battles are too easy.

Please read this post in full before you respond.

Most of us consider getting silver a fail though. Unless I get platinum on a quest, I consider myself having failed at it and the time wasted, because silver does not give me useful rewards at all, and never did.
I'm pretty sure nothing can be completed on platinum if you're afk the whole time.

That said, I do agree BBs could have been made harder. I'd have liked to see Tier 2 versions (as with instances) that are significantly more difficult to complete, and gave better rewards (twice the amount of medals?) in return.

Most of us consider getting silver a fail though. Unless I get platinum on a quest, I consider myself having failed at it and the time wasted, because silver does not give me useful rewards at all, and never did.
I'm pretty sure nothing can be completed on platinum if you're afk the whole time.

That said, I do agree BBs could have been made harder. I'd have liked to see Tier 2 versions (as with instances) that are significantly more difficult to complete, and gave better rewards (twice the amount of medals?) in return.

The point is that you can get some sort of reward without doing anything at all. You shouldn't even be able to complete it on iron if you afk like that.

It is, quite literally, impossible to lose any soldiers on the main wall during the Deeping Wall quest.

But that is false, because I have lost it several times, in raids and solo (works great duo though). Now no matter how bad a play you may think I am, I can't do worse than afk. All it takes is some bad luck so that you get the side quest enemies showing up exactly where the main quest enemies are with no one there to help out (yes I agree it takes a leader who knows what to do to solve this, but they're run infrequenty enough that good leaders are rare or else sticking to their own cliques).

If you don't believe me, go into Deeping Wall afk and see for yourself.

Ha, I'm trying it now to see... Pending results... (must resist urge to fire off catapults or put down traps) ...
Side quest of Securing the Culvert, failed of course. Afterwords I saw that only Gamling and a captain were left alive.
At respite number one, had lost one banner and one soldier, more than half the soldiers down in the yellow health range. But they healed up, which looks promising. Results may depend upon next side quest. Notice that the middle and right side defenders were taking the most damage, left side seemed ok and had its 2 banners up.

Starting up assault two. Banner goes down soon (they don't heal up out of combat).
Next side quest, Vanguard Defilers. Losing more soldiers now.
Soldier die off is accelerating fast! Now *I'm* dead because orcs climb the wall with only me as a target. Again the central and right side defenders are taking the brunt of it, left side is doing better. Then 5 banners down, 1 commander, 14 soldiers, and the game declares that the walls are overrun and I lose main quest. Fight keeps going because side quest is still active but I can't keep count of who's falling anymore. Then orcs are streaming down the back stairs to the deeping comb where I rezzed and I die again...

I don't even get the results showing iron/iron/iron when it's all over, no additional points added to any reward tier. Oh well, this is sort of what I expected. It was bad news getting Vanguard Defilers, since that means twice as many enemies showing up in the main fight area. But even before that quest started I could see that they seemed to be taking more damage. I think there's more incoming catapult damage than in the first round, plus one fewer defender.

From the game stats (this run did not add anything to stats) it shows me 3 bronze medals and zero iron in Deeping Wall solo main quest, and those three most definitely were not done AFK.

But that is false, because I have lost it several times, in raids and solo (works great duo though). Now no matter how bad a play you may think I am, I can't do worse than afk. All it takes is some bad luck so that you get the side quest enemies showing up exactly where the main quest enemies are with no one there to help out (yes I agree it takes a leader who knows what to do to solve this, but they're run infrequenty enough that good leaders are rare or else sticking to their own cliques).

Ha, I'm trying it now to see... Pending results... (must resist urge to fire off catapults or put down traps) ...
Side quest of Securing the Culvert, failed of course. Afterwords I saw that only Gamling and a captain were left alive.
At respite number one, had lost one banner and one soldier, more than half the soldiers down in the yellow health range. But they healed up, which looks promising. Results may depend upon next side quest. Notice that the middle and right side defenders were taking the most damage, left side seemed ok and had its 2 banners up.

Starting up assault two. Banner goes down soon (they don't heal up out of combat).
Next side quest, Vanguard Defilers. Losing more soldiers now.
Soldier die off is accelerating fast! Now *I'm* dead because orcs climb the wall with only me as a target. Again the central and right side defenders are taking the brunt of it, left side is doing better. Then 5 banners down, 1 commander, 14 soldiers, and the game declares that the walls are overrun and I lose main quest. Fight keeps going because side quest is still active but I can't keep count of who's falling anymore. Then orcs are streaming down the back stairs to the deeping comb where I rezzed and I die again...

I don't even get the results showing iron/iron/iron when it's all over, no additional points added to any reward tier. Oh well, this is sort of what I expected. It was bad news getting Vanguard Defilers, since that means twice as many enemies showing up in the main fight area. But even before that quest started I could see that they seemed to be taking more damage. I think there's more incoming catapult damage than in the first round, plus one fewer defender.

From the game stats (this run did not add anything to stats) it shows me 3 bronze medals and zero iron in Deeping Wall solo main quest, and those three most definitely were not done AFK.

I'm not saying you're a bad player. I don't have a good reference point for that. I play a Runekeeper, the class that has it the easiest out of any in solo battles. I also didn't account for the sidequests affecting the main wall npcs. Maybe I got lucky with the catapult shots, but I lost no soldiers and only two banners. The quest that I got a Silver medal in without doing anything was Breaching the Hornburg. I also set up Barricades and a Ballista for the sidequest I was hoping for(Vandals in the Tower), which drew the sappers from one side of the wall. So completely afk was not accurate. My point stands even if your result was the correct one, you shouldn't be able to survive for that long completely afk. They are still too easy. If you're doing to allow two people into a solo instance, at least make the solo version challenging.

I don't know about other servers, but I get a group together and run the raid on Elendilmir most days I'm online. Not every day, but I still have 26 runs where I start with just me and pick everyone up from glff.

After reading what they said about vanguard and the npc's stealing kills,well
I finally have enough points to check it out and was wondering if anyone else
bothered to try yet what I plan. That's to move a barricade or two down low
on the path to see if it helps me get first crack at them.

My main issue is being forced to spend the whole time clicking things instead of going for combat.

Some people enjoy engineer and officer, which I do to some extent; but as a Warden, combat in BBs is awful. Half your gambit builders don;t register and sometimes you'll be left with a gambit stuck no matter how many times you use it.

Vanguard needs to be more useful. Engineers can build barricades and fire catapults, officers can heal and give target priorities etc.

Vanguards MAY, if they are lucky, have the CHANCE to earn a killstreak.

Vanguards MAY, if they are lucky, have the CHANCE to earn a killstreak.

True, I think Vanguards should be beefed up, at least so that low tiers in Vanguard are worth the equivalent of an Officer or Engineer. Especially since so many classes rely on building up skills to be stronger (warden gambits, captain readied states, champion fervour, burglar crit responses, etc). You're in and out of combat so fast that it's frustrating (though useful since you can change specializations on the fly).